


rumor has it

by dutchydoescoke



Series: fixed points [4]
Category: Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-30
Updated: 2018-10-30
Packaged: 2019-08-09 23:20:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16458971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dutchydoescoke/pseuds/dutchydoescoke
Summary: “Rumor has it you’re having an affair with Cleon behind my back.”Gossip.





	rumor has it

**Author's Note:**

> you guys have no idea how much effort it took to refrain from titling this “xoxo, gossip neal” or something similar. this one’s a little more light-hearted than the first two fics. not that those were necessarily that angsty or whatever, it’s just that this is more for fun.
> 
> deliberately left ambiguous as to whether or not there are any feelings there because my neal/kel loving heart wouldn’t let me make it strictly platonic. what can i say, i'm a sap who’s been bitter about neal/kel not being canon endgame for, like, a decade. (don’t @ me okay, i know.)

“Rumor has it you’re having an affair with Cleon behind my back,” Neal says from his seat on her bed, looking up from his book, startling her when she steps into the tent. “Of course, rumor also has it that it’s a ploy to distract from our relationship.”

“They’re _still going?_ ” Kel sounds surprised and he’s reminded that she’s never paid attention to the palace gossip. It’s followed the Progress, flaring up whenever they’re seen together. There had been enough rumors from her being the sole girl among the pages and squires, but something about them rescuing Lalasa together made the gossips decide that they were in love or something.

It’s almost impressive with how much people have kept it up in the last two years. Neal supposes the fact that he makes sure to find her whenever they’re in the same place doesn’t help matters, walking around with an arm around her shoulders like when they were pages and she was still shorter than him.

“At this rate, I suspect they assume we’ll be married by the time we get our shields,” he continues, because that’s been one of his personal favorites since he first heard it, if only because he can’t imagine Kel marrying anyone most of the time with her focusing on her shield and helping people. “You should be so lucky.”

Kel just gives him her most unimpressed look and shoves at him when she sits down next to him. He knows she has another joust tomorrow, this one against Voelden, and he also knows she should be sleeping, but he wants to see her, free of their friends and people that look at them sideways every time he touches her. He slings his arm around her shoulders, the best he can offer when they’re sitting like this, and pretends not to notice when she leans her head on his shoulder.

“I’m almost afraid to find out what other nonsense they’ve been spreading,” she says, like Neal won’t tell her anyway. He’s always found the palace gossip amusing and shares the most ridiculous ones and the ones he likes the most with her. It’s as much so she can get a good laugh when she needs one as the fact that she should at least have some grasp on what’s being said about her, even if she doesn’t care. He tilts his head to rest against hers and closes his book finally.

“Shall I start with the ones that assume that you’re not only having an affair with Cleon but also Raoul or the ones where you and Princess Shinkokami are having an affair behind the backs of both Roald and myself? Or, perhaps, the ones where we’ve had an incredibly messy separation and are no longer on speaking terms and merely meet in public to keep up appearances?”

Kel actually laughs at that one, shaking with it enough to dislodge his arm.

“As if I could ever be rid of you.”

\---

He’s sitting next to the bed when she finally wakes and helps her sit up, the blanket wrapped around her. The privacy screen that’s folded and resting in the corner should be put up and he should be back in his chair before the healer walks in and sees them like this, but Neal can’t bring himself to care, sitting next to her on the narrow camp bed.

“You need to stop giving me heart attacks, Mindelan. I can’t _take_ this,” he says with his usual dramatics. Kel says nothing and takes a sip from the cup of water on the side table, but he knows she’s refraining from a comment about his age. “I should have just hit him yesterday.” As if Owen hadn’t held him back from doing exactly that, Owen standing in front of him to restrain him while Merric kept Cleon from doing anything.

“You’d just be the one against him next,” she replies and Neal makes a face. “And you’re terrible at tilting, you’d get yourself killed.”

He wants to fake offense but she’s right. Alanna’s never bothered with training him on the lance, as much because _she’s_ terrible at it herself as the fact that they’d both rather spend the time training in healing. The Progress has given him plenty of chance to practice on people, between injuries from the tournaments and sniffles from having so many people in a single place. He’s gotten better, miles ahead of where he’d been when he’d exhausted himself with Kel and Lalasa.

If he’s honest, he’s a little bitter he hadn’t been here in enough time to be the one to heal her. His fingers still itch with the urge to check her over himself and make sure she’s alright.

For all he’d been joking, seeing Voelden’s lance hit her had worried him. The fact that her injuries were limited to bruised ribs with a single one cracked didn’t reassure him much and he just wants to be sure everything healed okay.

“Just go ahead and check. I know you want to,” Kel says. Neal almost hates how easily she can read him sometimes but takes the chance she’s given him, Gift sparking to life around his fingers while he does his own exam. Her ribs are healed fine and aside from an errant bruise or two, she’s in perfect health. He heals up the bruises for lack of anything else to do. “Feel better now?”

“I regret ever being friends with you,” he says, more to see her smile than a genuine complaint. “I should have stayed at university.”

Kel doesn’t bother to acknowledge the lie, instead leaning against him in the familiar exhaustion that comes with being healed. He wraps an arm around her shoulders, familiar in a way he knows will raise eyebrows, but he’s ceased caring and she never did.

“I apologize for the newest gossip,” he says after a moment. She snorts and immediately looks horrified, like she can’t believe she did that. For all she’s practiced in their culture, Kel can’t hold her mask up when she’s tired, and he appreciates the sight of her not being able to hide. “I may have come after you in a fit of worry.”

“Why do I get the feeling Alanna held you back from doing something stupid?” she asks and Neal gasps in mock offense.

“How _dare_ you imply that I do anything stupid.” She looks unamused. Neal sighs and continues, “anyway, I intend to find out what the latest gossip is. See if that kills any of the rumors about us separating, perhaps.”

“Just don’t make me listen to it again.”

\---

“What gossip has Dom spread now?” she asks, lying on the bunk next to his, staring up at the ceiling of the minuscule room they’ve been put in together at Mastiff. They’re only here for a few nights, at least, until someone finds a new place for the refugee camp and they’re back to work.

He knows why she’s asking, that the images at Rathhausak are haunting her still, so he thinks to the first bit Dom shared and smiles faintly.

“Apparently, Raoul is part of some betting pool on us. Dom refused to say what it was about but given that he told me this after seeing us sleeping next to each other, I can only imagine,” Neal says. He reaches out without thinking, across the scant foot between their beds, and takes her hand in comfort. “The other good bit of gossip is that we’re married in secret and the children of Haven are all ours from illicit trysts as squires.”

There’s an undignified choking noise from Kel’s bed and he turns his head to grin at her incredulous expression.

“My thoughts exactly, for the record. You’d have been a terrible mother as a squire. All that _tilting_.” He shudders at the thought, playing it up as much as he can, because she needs something fun tonight.

“Yes, because you’d have been an exemplary father yourself,” she says, voice as dry as his often is. “All that _reading_.”

They fall quiet after that and Neal watches her stare at the ceiling. She doesn’t acknowledge her hand in his beyond a light squeeze, mouthing something to herself that Neal suspects is prayers for the lives Blayce destroyed.

“I still see them. The bodies. His workshop,” she says after the candle burns itself down to nothing, the only light from the moon outside. “I can’t seem to think of anything else.”

“I could tell you my favorite rumor,” he offers and sees Kel nod. “Supposedly, we’re only friends who spend a lot of time together. Completely absurd, of course.”

Kel’s huffed laughter is a beautiful thing to hear after the last week of hell.

“Absolutely unbelievable,” she says, smiling wide enough that he can see her teeth in the moonlight. “No truth to that at all.”

**Author's Note:**

> so. this was kind of. a lot heavier on the implied neal/kel than i meant but who gives a fuck. boundaries are a thing they’re bad at these days. (but that's a whooooole other fic. so.)
> 
> (i also have a whole separate fic that goes au in lady knight to finish. and three other fics. oi.)


End file.
